GARNER STATE PARK—Rebecca Strange prays regularly for God to use her and her husband, Richard, a lay pastor at Cowboy Church of Tarrant County, according to his will. On Aug. 6, God orchestrated a series of events so they would be available to save lives, the couple believes.
Visiting Garner State Park on their honeymoon, the Stranges decided to stay a day beyond their initial plans. The extra time gave them a chance to go fishing in the evening.
They hadn’t caught anything of significant size and were ready to pack up for the night. Then Rebecca Strange spied “the biggest bass I’ve ever seen in my life,” which encouraged her to keep casting a bit longer.
Only ones to hear the screams
After a bit, she didn’t catch anything and went to sit on a park bench as the sun set, and her husband cast four or five more times in last-ditch attempts to catch the bass. When they failed, the couple visited for a few moments on a remote picnic bench.
They were the only people around to hear screams.
They discovered an elementary-age boy yelling and thrashing in the water while his parents cried out to him from the bank. The boy’s father jumped in the lake to save his son, but he could not swim and had to wade back to the shore.
The Stranges jumped in the water. They soon discovered the boy dived in to save his sister, who also could not swim. The couple began working their way to the children.
Just as they began to move the young people to safety, the boy screamed again. His mother had jumped in the lake to try to help the Stranges and was going under. Quickly, Rebecca Strange held the children, and her husband grabbed their mother.
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By that time, other people gathered on the shoreline. The Stranges borrowed inflatable rafts from bystanders and floated the children and mother back to dry land.
Physically and emotionally exhausted
The experience left the Stranges physically and emotionally exhausted.
“We got back to the campsite,” Strange said. “Rebecca cried. I sat there numb.”
Days later, she still cries when recounting the tale. He stammers a bit when talking about it. The entire day, God was guiding them, they believe, so they would be at the lake at that moment.
“I just don’t believe it was God’s will for those kids to drown that day,” she said. “We were just the people to make sure that didn’t happen.”
All that happened—from deciding to stay an extra day, to seeing the large bass, to casting a few more times, to talking on the picnic bench—were “God moments,” they agree.
God used small decisions and events to accomplish significant tasks, the Stranges insisted.
“I feel really blessed,” he said. “My family feels blessed. … We’re not the hero in this. The hero in this is God.”
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